Analysis of particular works or institutions is, in this context, analysis of their essential kind of organization, the relationships which works or institutions embody as parts of the organization as a whole. A key-word, in such analysis, is pattern: it is with the discovery of patterns of a characteristic kind that any useful cultural analysis begins, and it is with the relationships between these patterns, which sometimes reveal unexpected identities and correspondences in hitherto separately considered activities, sometimes again reveal discontinuities of an unexpected kind, that general cultural analysis is concerned.
Once the carriers of such a structure die, the nearest we can get to this vital element is in the documentary culture , from poems to buildings and dress-fashions, and it is this relation that gives significance to the definition of culture in documentary terms.
This in no way means that the documents are autonomous. It is simply that, as previously argued, the significance of an activity must be sought in terms of the whole organization, which is more than the sum of its separable parts. What we are looking for, always, is the actual life that the whole organization is there to express. The significance of documentary culture is that, more clearly than anything else, it expresses that life to us in direct terms, when the living witnesses are silent.
At the same time, if we reflect on the nature of a structure of feeling, and see how it can fail to be fully understood even by living people in close contact with it, with ample material at their disposal, including the contemporary arts, we shall not suppose that we can ever do more than make an approach, an approximation, using any channels.
We need to distinguish three levels of culture , even in its most general definition. There is the lived culture of a particular time and place, only fully accessible to those living in that time and place. There is the recorded culture , of every kind, from art to the most everyday facts: the culture of a period. There is also, as the factor connecting lived culture and period culture s, the culture of the selective tradition.
It is very important to try to understand the operation of a selective tradition. Particular lines will be drawn, often for as long as a century, and then suddenly with some new stage in growth these will be cancelled or weakened, and new lines drawn.
In the analysis of contemporary culture , the existing state of the selective tradition is of vital importance, for it is often true that some change in this tradition — establishing new lines with the past, breaking or re-drawing existing lines — is a radical kind of contemporary change. We tend to underestimate the extent to which the cultural tradition is not only a selection but also an interpretation.
We see most past work through our own experience, without even making the effort to see it in something like its original terms. Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Sign In or Create an Account. Sign In. Advanced Search. Search Menu. Article Navigation.
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Books Add to list Added to list. Edited by: Jim McGuigan. Show all Show less. More information Less information. Alexander, Professor of Sociology, Yale University Celebrating the significant intellectual legacy and enduring influence of Raymond Williams, this exciting collection introduces a whole new generation to his work. Powerfully asserting the on-going relevance of Williams within our contemporary neoliberal and digital age, the book: Includes texts which have never been anthologised before; Situates Williams' work both biographically and historically; Provides a comprehensive introduction to Williams' social-scientific work; Demonstrates the enduring relevance of cultural materialism.
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